It’s Grande to see you on top form, Ariana
BY THE beginning of last year, Ariana Grande was on the way to becoming the foremost female pop star of her generation. The young pretender had been a Broadway actress and children’s TV entertainer, but her powerful voice earmarked her as heir apparent to Taylor Swift and Katy Perry.
Her three albums had chronicled an assured progression from teenybop fare to more mature sounds and her calling card was an agile, multi-octave falsetto that drew comparisons with the breathless whistle tones of Mariah Carey.
Normally, this fourth album would simply seal the deal, catapulting the pony-tailed 25-year-old from Florida to superstardom.
But Grande’s career will forever be framed by last May’s Manchester Arena atrocity, when a suicide bomber blew himself up as fans were leaving a show on her Dangerous Woman Tour, killing 22 and injuring hundreds.
Her response was admirable and dignified. Within weeks, she returned to host the One Love Manchester benefit concert and visit hospitalised fans.
The traumas of last May have changed her, though, and Sweetener — out today — pushes her further away from her roots in easily digestible bubblegum pop.
There are no direct references to Manchester. That’s surely for the best. Addressing a tragedy of such magnitude on a dancepop record could have been viewed as trivialising it.
However, Ariana is more reflective. There’s much talk here of overcoming emotional upheaval, though couched in traditional love songs.
Raindrops (An Angel Cried) is an a capella lovesick lament that puts her voice centre-stage. Synth number The Light Is Coming hints at a new start: ‘The light is coming to give back everything the darkness stole.’
Her sound has been updated, echoing the bold move Taylor Swift made when she abandoned Nashville for electronic styles on her album 1989. Grande’s two main collaborators here are R&B guru Pharrell Williams and Swedish producer Max Martin (also a Taylor favourite) and they complement each other well.
Pharrell supervises the off-kilter moments, adding jittery beats and wonky electronics, while overseeing rap cameos from Missy Elliott and Nicki Minaj.
Meanwhile, Martin supplies more atmospheric touches, cloaking his keyboards and guitars in digital effects. He also ensures the singles, No Tears Left To Cry and God Is A Woman, have big, radio-friendly hooks.
Ariana’s power and control are well to the fore on the uptempo Breathin’ and she hits a Mariahstyle high note on Goodnight N Go, but it would have been satisfying to hear her cut loose more regularly.
PERHAPSher reluctance is in keeping with an album that, for all its positivity, is understandably thoughtful.
Grande announced her engagement to Saturday Night Live cast member Pete Davidson in June and her happy love life is the focus of a string of dreamy, mid-tempo pieces.
There’s even a track named after her fiancé, although Pete Davidson, the song, is little more than a fleeting, fuzzy interlude with chamber strings.
Grande pokes fun at her own celebrity on the droll Successful and makes some surprisingly raunchy suggestions on the electronic ballad Better Off.
The upshot is an album of thoroughly modern pop and soul. Sweetener would benefit from a few edits, but it contains enough of the Ariana dazzle to keep her legion of fans happy.
After the events of Manchester, that alone is enough to make it a welcome return.